Ostrovsky's biography is briefly the most important. Biography

playwright, whose work became the most important stage in the development of the Russian national theater

Alexander Ostrovsky

short biography

Alexander Nikolaevich Ostrovsky April 12, 1823 in Moscow on Malaya Ordynka. His father, Nikolai Fedorovich, was the son of a priest, he himself graduated from the Kostroma Seminary, then the Moscow Theological Academy, but began to practice as a court lawyer, dealing with property and commercial matters; rose to the rank of collegiate assessor, and in 1839 received the nobility. Mother, Lyubov Ivanovna Savvina, the daughter of a sexton and a prosvir, died when Alexander was not yet nine years old. There were four children in the family (four more died in infancy). The younger brother is the statesman M. N. Ostrovsky. Thanks to the position of Nikolai Fedorovich, the family lived in prosperity, great attention was paid to the study of children who received home education. Five years after the death of Alexander's mother, his father married Baroness Emily Andreevna von Tessin, the daughter of a Swedish nobleman. The children were lucky with their stepmother: she surrounded them with care and continued to teach them.

Ostrovsky's childhood and part of his youth were spent in the center of Zamoskvorechye. Thanks to his father's large library, he got acquainted early with Russian literature and felt a penchant for writing, but his father wanted to make him a lawyer. In 1835, Ostrovsky entered the third grade of the 1st Moscow Provincial Gymnasium, after which in 1840 he became a student at the law faculty of Moscow University. He failed to complete the university course: without passing the exam in Roman law, Ostrovsky wrote a letter of resignation (he studied until 1843). At the request of his father, Ostrovsky entered the service of a clerk in the Constituent Court and served in the Moscow courts until 1850; his first salary was 4 rubles a month, after a while it increased to 16 rubles (transferred to the Commercial Court in 1845).

By 1846, Ostrovsky had already written many scenes from merchant life and conceived the comedy "Insolvent Debtor" (later - "Own people - let's settle!"). The very first publication was a short play “A Picture of Family Life” and an essay “Notes of a Zamoskvoretsky Resident” - they were published in one of the issues of the “Moscow City List” in 1847. Professor of Moscow University S.P. Shevyrev, after Ostrovsky read the play at his home on February 14, 1847, solemnly congratulated the audience on "the appearance of a new dramatic luminary in Russian literature."

A. N. Ostrovsky.

Literary fame for Ostrovsky was brought by the comedy “Our people - let's settle!”, Published in 1850 in the journal of the university professor M. P. Pogodin “Moskvityanin”. Under the text was: "A. ABOUT." (Alexander Ostrovsky) and "D. G.". Under the middle initials was Dmitry Gorev-Tarasenkov, a provincial actor who offered Ostrovsky cooperation. This cooperation did not go beyond one scene, and subsequently served as a source of great trouble for Ostrovsky, since it gave his detractors a reason to accuse him of plagiarism (1856). However, the play evoked favorable responses from H. V. Gogol, I. A. Goncharov. The influential Moscow merchants, offended by their estate, complained to the "bosses"; as a result, the comedy was banned from staging, and the author was dismissed from service and placed under police supervision on the personal order of Nicholas I. Supervision was removed after the accession of Alexander II, and the play was allowed to be staged only in 1861.

Ostrovsky's first play, which was able to get on the stage, was Don't Get into Your Sleigh, written in 1852 and staged for the first time in Moscow on the stage of the Maly Theater on January 14, 1853.

For more than thirty years, since 1853, new plays by Ostrovsky appeared almost every season in the Moscow Maly and Alexandrinsky theaters in St. Petersburg. Since 1856, Ostrovsky became a permanent contributor to the Sovremennik magazine. In the same year, in accordance with the wishes of the Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich, a business trip of outstanding writers took place to study and describe various areas of Russia in industrial and domestic terms. Ostrovsky took over the study of the Volga from the upper reaches to Nizhny Novgorod.

A. N. Ostrovsky, 1856

In 1859, with the assistance of Count G. A. Kushelev-Bezborodko, the first collected works of Ostrovsky were published in two volumes. Thanks to this edition, Ostrovsky received a brilliant assessment from N. A. Dobrolyubov, which secured him the fame of a depicter of the “dark kingdom”. In 1860, the Thunderstorm appeared in print, to which Dobrolyubov dedicated the article “A Ray of Light in a Dark Kingdom”. From the second half of the 1860s, Ostrovsky took up the history of the Time of Troubles and entered into correspondence with Kostomarov. Five “historical chronicles in verse” became the fruit of the work: “Kuzma Zakharyich Minin-Sukhoruk”, “Vasilisa Melentyeva”, “Dmitry the Pretender and Vasily Shuisky”, etc.

In 1863, Ostrovsky was awarded the Uvarov Prize (for the play The Thunderstorm) and was elected a corresponding member of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences. In 1866 (according to other sources - in 1865), Ostrovsky founded the Artistic Circle, which later gave the Moscow stage many talented figures. Ostrovsky's house was visited by I. A. Goncharov, D. V. Grigorovich, I. S. Turgenev, A. F. Pisemsky, F. M. Dostoevsky, I. E. Turchaninov, P. M. Sadovsky, L. P. Kositskaya-Nikulina, M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin, L. N. Tolstoy, P. I. Tchaikovsky, M. N. Ermolova, G. N. Fedotova.

In 1874, the Society of Russian Dramatic Writers and Opera Composers was formed, of which Ostrovsky remained the permanent chairman until his death. Working in the commission "for the revision of legal provisions in all parts of the theater management", established in 1881 under the directorate of the Imperial Theaters, he achieved many changes that significantly improved the position of artists. In 1885, Ostrovsky was appointed head of the repertoire of Moscow theaters and head of the theater school.

Despite the fact that his plays made good collections and that in 1883 Emperor Alexander III granted him an annual pension of 3 thousand rubles, money problems did not leave Ostrovsky until the last days of his life. Health did not meet the plans that he set for himself. Hard work exhausted the body.

On June 2 (14), 1886, on Spirits Day, Ostrovsky died in his Kostroma estate Shchelykovo. His last work was the translation of "Antony and Cleopatra" by William Shakespeare - Alexander Nikolayevich's favorite playwright. The writer was buried next to his father at the church cemetery near the Temple in the name of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker in the village of Nikolo-Berezhki, Kostroma province. For the burial, Alexander III granted 3,000 rubles from the sums of the cabinet; the widow, inseparably with 2 children, was assigned a pension of 3,000 rubles, and for the upbringing of three sons and a daughter - 2,400 rubles a year. Subsequently, the widow of the writer M.V. Ostrovskaya, an actress of the Maly Theater, and the daughter of M.A. Shatelen were buried in the family necropolis.

After the death of the playwright, the Moscow Duma set up a reading room named after A. N. Ostrovsky in Moscow.

Family

The younger brother is the statesman M. N. Ostrovsky.

Alexander Nikolaevich had a deep passion for the actress Lyubov Kositskaya, but both of them had a family. However, even after becoming a widow in 1862, Kositskaya continued to reject Ostrovsky's feelings, and soon she began a close relationship with the son of a wealthy merchant, who eventually squandered her entire fortune; She wrote to Ostrovsky: "... I do not want to take away your love from anyone."

The playwright lived in cohabitation with the commoner Agafya Ivanovna, but all their children died at an early age. Having no education, but being a smart woman, with a subtle, easily vulnerable soul, she understood the playwright and was the very first reader and critic of his works. Ostrovsky lived with Agafya Ivanovna for about twenty years, and in 1869, two years after her death, he married the actress Maria Vasilyevna Bakhmetyeva, who bore him four sons and two daughters.

Creation

"Columbus Zamoskvorechye"

The play Poverty is Not a Vice (1853) was first staged on January 15, 1869 at the Maly Theater for a benefit performance by Prov Mikhailovich Sadovsky.

Ostrovsky Theater

Russian theater in its modern sense begins with A. N. Ostrovsky: the playwright created a theater school and an integral concept of theatrical production.

The essence of Ostrovsky's theater is the absence of extreme situations and opposition to the actor's gut. Alexander Nikolaevich's plays depict ordinary situations with ordinary people, whose dramas go into everyday life and human psychology.

The main ideas of the theater reform:

the theater should be built on conventions (there is a 4th wall separating the audience from the actors);
invariability of attitude to language: mastery of speech characteristics, expressing almost everything about the characters;
betting on more than one actor;

“A good play will please the public and be successful, but will not last long on the repertoire if poorly played: the public goes to the theater to see a good performance of good plays, and not the play itself; play can be read. Othello is no doubt a good play; but the public did not want to watch it when Charsky played the role of Othello. The interest of the performance is a complex matter: both the play and the performance are equally involved in it. When both are good, the performance is interesting; when one thing is bad, then the performance loses its interest.
- "Note on the draft "Rules on the Imperial Theater Prizes for Dramatic Works""

Ostrovsky's theater demanded a new stage aesthetics, new actors. In accordance with this, Ostrovsky creates an ensemble of actors, which includes such actors as Martynov, Sergei Vasiliev, Evgeny Samoilov, Prov Sadovsky.

Naturally, innovations met opponents. They were, for example, Shchepkin. The dramaturgy of Ostrovsky demanded from the actor a detachment from his personality, which MS Shchepkin did not do. For example, he left the dress rehearsal of The Thunderstorm, being very dissatisfied with the author of the play.

Ostrovsky's ideas were brought to their logical end by K. S. Stanislavsky and M. A. Bulgakov.

Folk myths and national history in the dramaturgy of Ostrovsky

“The music for my The Snow Maiden is amazing, I could never imagine anything more suitable for it and so vividly expressing all the poetry of the Russian pagan cult and this first snow-cold, and then irresistibly passionate heroine of a fairy tale.”

The appearance of the poetic play by Ostrovsky "The Snow Maiden", created on the basis of the fabulous, song and song-ritual material of Russian poetry, was caused by an accidental circumstance. In 1873, the Maly Theater was closed for major repairs, and its troupe moved to the building of the Bolshoi Theatre. The Commission for the Management of the Imperial Moscow Theaters decided to put on an extravaganza performance in which all three troupes would participate: drama, opera and ballet. With a proposal to write such a play in a very short time, they turned to A.N. Ostrovsky, who willingly agreed to this, deciding to use the plot from the folk tale "The Snow Maiden Girl". The music for the play, at the request of Ostrovsky, was commissioned by the young P. I. Tchaikovsky. Both the playwright and the composer worked on the play with great enthusiasm, very quickly, in close creative contact. On March 31, on his fiftieth birthday, Ostrovsky finished The Snow Maiden. The first performance took place on May 11, 1873 at the Bolshoi Theatre.

While working on The Snow Maiden, Ostrovsky carefully searched for the sizes of poems, consulted with historians, archaeologists, experts in ancient life, turned to a large amount of historical and folklore material, including The Tale of Igor's Campaign. He himself highly appreciated this play of his, and wrote, "I<…>in this work I go out on a new road”; he spoke enthusiastically about Tchaikovsky's music: "Tchaikovsky's music for The Snow Maiden is charming." I. S. Turgenev was “captivated by the beauty and lightness of the language of the Snegurochka.” P. I. Tchaikovsky, working on The Snow Maiden, wrote: “I have been sitting at work without getting up for about a month; I am writing music for Ostrovsky’s magic play “The Snow Maiden,” he considered the dramatic work itself to be the pearl of Ostrovsky’s creations, and said this about his music for him: “This is one of my favorite brainchildren. The spring was wonderful, my soul was good ... I liked Ostrovsky's play, and in three weeks, without any effort, I wrote the music.

Later, in 1880, N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov wrote an opera based on the same plot. M. M. Ippolitov-Ivanov writes in his memoirs: “With some special warmth, Alexander Nikolayevich spoke about Tchaikovsky’s music for The Snow Maiden, which, obviously, greatly prevented him from admiring Rimsky-Korsakov’s The Snow Maiden. Undoubtedly ... Tchaikovsky's sincere music ... was closer to Ostrovsky's soul, and he did not hide the fact that she was dearer to him, as a populist.

Here is how K. S. Stanislavsky spoke about The Snow Maiden: “The Snow Maiden is a fairy tale, a dream, a national legend, written, told in Ostrovsky's magnificent sonorous verses. One might think that this playwright, the so-called realist and everyday worker, never wrote anything but wonderful poems, and was not interested in anything other than pure poetry and romance.

Criticism

Ostrovsky's work became the subject of fierce debate among critics of both the 19th and 20th centuries. In the 19th century, Dobrolyubov (the articles "Dark Kingdom" and "Ray of Light in the Dark Kingdom") and Apollon Grigoriev wrote about him from opposite positions. In the XX century - Mikhail Lobanov (in the book "Ostrovsky", published in the series "ZhZL"), M. A. Bulgakov and V. Ya. Lakshin.

Memory

Central Library named after A. N. Ostrovsky (Rzhev, Tver region).
Moscow Regional Drama Theater named after A. N. Ostrovsky.
Kostroma State Drama Theater named after A. N. Ostrovsky.
Ural Regional Drama Theater named after A. N. Ostrovsky.
Irbit Drama Theater named after A. N. Ostrovsky (Irbit, Sverdlovsk region).
Kineshma Drama Theater named after A. N. Ostrovsky (Ivanovo region).
Tashkent State Theater and Art Institute named after A. N. Ostrovsky.
Streets in a number of cities of the former USSR.
On May 27, 1929, a monument to Ostrovsky was unveiled in front of the Maly Theater (sculptor N. A. Andreev, architect I. P. Mashkov) (the jury preferred it over the monument to Ostrovsky, submitted to the competition by A. S. Golubkina, who depicted the great playwright at the moment captivating viewer creative impulse).
In 1984, in Zamoskvorechye, in the house where the great playwright was born - a cultural monument of the early 20s of the XIX century, a branch of the Theater Museum named after. A. A. Bakhrushin - House-Museum of A. N. Ostrovsky.
Now in Shchelykovo (Kostroma region) there is a memorial and natural museum-reserve of the playwright.
Once every five years, since 1973, the All-Russian Theater Festival "Ostrovsky's Days in Kostroma" lights up the stage, which is supervised by the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation and the Union of Theater Workers of the Russian Federation (All-Russian Theater Society).
A memorial plaque in Tver, on Sovetskaya (former Millionnaya) Street, house 7, informs that the playwright lived in this house, the Barsukov hotel, in the spring and summer of 1856, during his trip to the Upper Volga region.
Every two years, since 1993, the Maly Theater hosts the Ostrovsky in the Ostrovsky House festival, to which theaters from all over Russia bring their performances based on the plays of the playwright to Moscow.
Ostrovsky's plays never leave the stage. Many of his works have been filmed or served as the basis for the creation of film and television scripts.
Among the film adaptations most popular in Russia is Konstantin Voinov's comedy Balzaminov's Marriage (1964, starring G. Vitsin).
The film "Cruel Romance", filmed by Eldar Ryazanov based on "Dowry" (1984), received considerable popularity.
In 2005, director Evgeny Ginzburg received the main prize ( Grand Prix "Garnet Bracelet") of the eleventh Russian festival "Literature and cinema" (Gatchina) " for the amazing interpretation of the great play by A. N. Ostrovsky "Guilty Without Guilt" in the film "Anna""(2005, screenplay by G. Danelia and Rustam Ibragimbekov; starring opera singer Lyubov Kazarnovskaya).

In philately

Postage stamps of the USSR

Portrait of A. N. Ostrovsky - postage stamp of the USSR. 1948

Portrait of A. N. Ostrovsky based on a painting by V. Perov (1871, State Tretyakov Gallery) Postage stamp of the USSR. 1948

Postage stamp of the USSR, 1959.

Playwright A. N. Ostrovsky (1823-1886), actors M. N. Ermolova (1853-1928), P. S. Mochalov (1800-1848), M. S. Shchepkin (1788-1863) and P. M. Sadovsky (1818-1872). Postage stamp of the USSR 1949.

Plays

"Family Picture" (1847)
"Own people - let's count" (1849)
"An Unexpected Case" (1850)
"Young Man's Morning" (1850)
"Poor Bride" (1851)
"Do not get into your sleigh" (1852)
"Poverty is no vice" (1853)
"Do not live as you like" (1854)
"Hangover at a stranger's feast" (1856) text. The play was first staged on the stage of the theater on January 9, 1856 at the Maly Theater for the benefit performance of Prov Mikhailovich Sadovsky, and then, on January 18, in St. Petersburg on the stage of the Alexandrinsky Theater for the benefit performance of Vladimirova.
"Profitable Place" (1856) text The play was first staged on the stage of the theater on September 27, 1863 at the Alexandrinsky Theater for Levkeeva's benefit performance. It was first staged at the Maly Theater on October 14 of the same year for a benefit performance by E. N. Vasilyeva.
"Festive Sleep Before Dinner" (1857)
"Did not get along!" (1858)
"Pupil" (1859)
"Thunderstorm" (1859)
"An old friend is better than two new ones" (1860)
“Your own dogs squabble, don’t pester someone else’s” (1861)
"The Marriage of Balzaminov" (1861)
"Kozma Zakharyich Minin-Sukhoruk" (1861, 2nd edition 1866)
"Hard Days" (1863)
"Sin and trouble does not live on anyone" (1863)
Voevoda (1864; 2nd edition 1885)
"Joker" (1864)
"In a Busy Place" (1865)
"Abyss" (1866)
"Dmitry the Pretender and Vasily Shuisky" (1866)
"Tushino" (1866)
"Vasilisa Melentyeva" (co-authored with S. A. Gedeonov) (1867)
"Sufficient Simplicity for Every Wise Man" (1868)
"Hot Heart" (1869)
"Mad Money" (1870)
"Forest" (1870)
"Not everything is Shrovetide for the cat" (1871)
“There was not a penny, but suddenly an altyn” (1872) text On December 10, 1872, the first performance of the comedy took place at the Maly Theater for Musil's benefit performance.
"Comedian of the 17th century" (1873)
"Snow Maiden" (1873) text. In 1881, the premiere of the opera by N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov took place on the stage of the Mariinsky Theater
"Late Love" (1874) text On November 22, 1874, the first performance of the comedy took place at the Maly Theater for Musil's benefit performance.
Labor Bread (1874) text On November 28, 1874, the first performance of the comedy took place at the Maly Theater for Musil's benefit performance.
"Wolves and Sheep" (1875)
"Rich Brides" (1876) text On November 30, 1876, the first performance of the comedy took place at the Maly Theater for Musil's benefit performance.
“Truth is good, but happiness is better” (1877) text On November 18, 1877, the first performance of the comedy took place at the Maly Theater for Musil's benefit performance.
"The Marriage of Belugin" (1877), together with Nikolai Solovyov
The Last Victim (1878)
"Dowry" (1878) text On November 10, 1878, the first performance of the drama took place at the Maly Theater for Musil's benefit performance.
"Good gentleman" (1879)
"Wild Woman" (1879), together with Nikolai Solovyov
"Heart is not a stone" (1880)
"Slaves" (1881)
"Shines, but does not warm" (1881), together with Nikolai Solovyov text. Premiere November 14, 1881 in St. Petersburg, at the Alexandrinsky Theater, in the benefit of F. A. Burdin.
"Guilty Without Guilt" (1881-1883)
"Talents and Admirers" (1882)
"Handsome Man" (1883)
"Not of this world" (1885)

Screen versions of works

1911 - Vasilisa Melentyeva
1911 - In a lively place (film, 1911)
1916 - Guilty without guilt
1916 - In a busy place (film, 1916, Chardynin)
1916 - In a lively place (film, 1916, Sabinsky) (Another name On the big road)
1933 - Storm
1936 - Dowry
1945 - Guilty without guilt
1951 - Truth is good, but happiness is better (film-play)
1952 - Wolves and sheep (teleplay)
1952 - Enough simplicity for every wise man (teleplay)
1952 - Snow Maiden (cartoon)
1953 - Hot Heart (film-play)
1955 - In a lively place (film-play)
1955 - Talents and Admirers (film-play)
1958 - Depths (TV film, screen version of the performance of the Leningrad Academic Drama Theater named after M.

Alexander Nikolayevich Ostrovsky is a great Russian playwright, author of 47 original plays. In addition, he translated more than 20 literary works: from Latin, Italian, Spanish, French, English.

Alexander Nikolayevich was born in Moscow in the family of a raznochinets official who lived in Zamoskvorechye, on Malaya Ordynka. It was an area where the merchants settled for a long time. Merchant mansions with their blind fences, pictures of everyday life and peculiar customs of the merchant world from early childhood sunk into the soul of the future playwright.

After graduating from the gymnasium, Ostrovsky, on the advice of his father, entered the law faculty of Moscow University in 1840. But legal sciences were not his vocation. In 1843, he left the university without completing his course of study, and decided to devote himself entirely to literary activity.

Not a single playwright showed pre-revolutionary life with such completeness as A. N. Ostrovsky. Representatives of the most diverse classes, people of different professions, origins, upbringing pass before us in the artistically truthful images of his comedies, dramas, scenes from life, historical chronicles. Life, customs, characters of the philistines, nobles, officials and mainly merchants - from "very important gentlemen", rich bar and businessmen to the most insignificant and poor - are reflected by A. N. Ostrovsky with amazing breadth.

The plays were written not by an indifferent writer of everyday life, but by an angry accuser of the world of the “dark kingdom”, where for the sake of profit a person is capable of anything, where the elders rule over the younger, the rich over the poor, where the state power, the church and society in every possible way support the cruel morals that have developed over the centuries.

The works of Ostrovsky contributed to the development of public consciousness. Their revolutionary influence was perfectly defined by Dobrolyubov; he wrote: "By drawing to us in a vivid picture false relations with all their consequences, he through the very same serves as an echo of aspirations that require a better device." No wonder the defenders of the existing system did everything in their power to prevent Ostrovsky's plays from being staged. His first one-act "Picture of Family Happiness" (1847) was immediately banned by theatrical censorship, and this play appeared only 8 years later. The first big four-act comedy “Our people - we will settle” (1850) was not allowed on the stage by Nicholas I himself, imposing a resolution: “It has been printed in vain, it is forbidden to play in any case.” And the play, heavily altered at the request of censorship, was staged only in 1861. The Tsar demanded information about the way of life and thoughts of Ostrovsky and, having received a report, ordered: "To have it under supervision." The secret office of the Moscow governor-general started the "Case of the writer Ostrovsky", behind him was established an unspoken gendarmerie supervision. The apparent "unreliability" of the playwright, who then served in the Moscow Commercial Court, so worried the authorities that Ostrovsky was forced to resign.

The comedy “Our people - let's settle” that was not allowed on the stage made the author widely known. It is not difficult to explain the reasons for such a major success of the play. As if alive, the faces of the tyrant-owner Bolshov, his unrequited, stupidly submissive wife, daughter Lipochka, distorted by an absurd education, and the rogue clerk Podkhalyuzin stand before us. "The Dark Kingdom" - this is how the great Russian critic N. A. Dobrolyubov described this musty, rough life based on despotism, ignorance, deceit and arbitrariness. Together with the actors of the Moscow Maly Theater Provo Sadovsky and the great Mikhail Shchepkin, Ostrovsky read comedy in various circles.

The huge success of the play, which, according to N. A. Dobrolyubov, “belonged to the most striking and seasoned works of Ostrovsky” and conquered “with the truth of the image and a true sense of reality,” made the guardians of the existing system alert. Almost every new play by Ostrovsky was banned by the censors or not approved for presentation by the theater authorities.

Even such a wonderful drama as The Thunderstorm (1859) was met with hostility by the reactionary nobility and the press. On the other hand, representatives of the democratic camp saw in Groz a sharp protest against the feudal-serf system and fully appreciated it. The artistic integrity of the images, the depth of the ideological content and the accusatory power of The Thunderstorm allow us to recognize it as one of the most perfect works of Russian drama.

The significance of Ostrovsky is great not only as a playwright, but also as the creator of the Russian theater. “You brought literature as a gift a whole library of works of art,” I. A. Goncharov wrote to Ostrovsky, “you created your own special world for the stage. You alone completed the building, at the base of which the cornerstones Fonvizin, Griboyedov, Gogol were laid. But only after you, we, Russians, can proudly say: we have our own Russian national theater. Ostrovsky's work constituted a whole epoch in the history of our theater. The name of Ostrovsky is especially strongly connected with the history of the Moscow Maly Theatre. Almost all of Ostrovsky's plays were staged in this theater during his lifetime. They brought up several generations of artists who grew into wonderful masters of the Russian stage. Ostrovsky's plays have played such a role in the history of the Maly Theater that it proudly calls itself the Ostrovsky House.

To perform new roles, a whole galaxy of new actors had to appear and appeared, as well as Ostrovsky, who knew Russian life. Ostrovsky's plays established and developed the national Russian school of realistic acting. Starting with Prov Sadovsky in Moscow and Alexander Martynov in St. Petersburg, several generations of capital and provincial actors, up to the present day, have grown up playing roles in Ostrovsky's plays. “Fidelity to reality, to the truth of life,” Dobrolyubov spoke of Ostrovsky’s works in this way, has become one of the essential features of our national stage art.

Dobrolyubov pointed out another feature of Ostrovsky's dramaturgy - "accuracy and fidelity of the folk language." No wonder Gorky called Ostrovsky "the sorcerer of the language." Each character of Ostrovsky speaks a language typical of his class, profession, upbringing. And the actor, creating this or that image, had to be able to use the necessary intonation, pronunciation and other speech means. Ostrovsky taught the actor to listen and hear how people speak in life.

The works of the great Russian playwright recreate not only his contemporary life. They also depict the years of Polish intervention at the beginning of the 17th century. (“Kozma Minin”, “Dmitry the Pretender and Vasily Shuisky”), and the legendary times of ancient Rus' (the spring fairy tale “The Snow Maiden”).

In the pre-revolutionary years, bourgeois audiences gradually began to lose interest in Ostrovsky's theater, considering it obsolete. On the Soviet stage, Ostrovsky's dramaturgy revived with renewed vigor. His plays are also performed on foreign stages.

L. N. Tolstoy wrote to the playwright in 1886: “I know from experience how your things are read, listened to and remembered by the people, and therefore I would like to help you become now as soon as possible in reality what you are, undoubtedly – nationwide – in the broadest sense, a writer”.

After the Great October Socialist Revolution, the work of A. N. Ostrovsky became popular among the people.

Alexander Nikolayevich Ostrovsky is one of the most prominent Russian playwrights, whose work has become an important stage in the development of Russian literature and the national theater. We can safely say that it was the works of Ostrovsky that laid the foundation for the Russian repertoire in the theater.

Ostrovsky's plays are known and loved by many generations of Russian viewers and readers. Feature films were shot on them, the questions that Ostrovsky raises in his works are still relevant today.

Childhood and youth

The Russian playwright was born on March 13, 1823 in Moscow, in the family of a court official. The mother of the future playwright died early, the family had six children. Ostrovsky's father really wanted his son to follow in his footsteps. After graduating from the Moscow gymnasium, Alexander enters the law faculty of Moscow University. Ostrovsky never finished it.

In 1843, Ostrovsky was hired as a court clerk and worked in various Moscow courts until 1851. This period of life helped Ostrovsky a lot in his future work. Working in the courts, he perfectly studied the world of the Russian merchant class and the petty-bourgeois class, which he later brilliantly described in his works. Many characters, characters are taken by the playwright from his real life.

First plays

In 1847, Ostrovsky's essays were published in the Moscow City Leaf newspaper under the title "Notes of a Zamoskvoretsky Resident". However, the playwright gained wide popularity after the publication of the play “Our people - we will settle down”. This work, written in the comedy genre, was enthusiastically received by the public and received excellent reviews from critics. Gogol and Goncharov spoke favorably of this play.

However, the representatives of the merchant class did not like the work very much, and after their complaint to the authorities, the play was forbidden to be staged, and its author was fired from his job. "Our people - let's settle" was allowed to be staged only after the death of Emperor Nicholas, in 1861. With the second play, Alexander Nikolayevich was much more fortunate. “Don’t get into your sleigh” was written by him in 1852 and already in 1853 appeared on the stage of theaters. Since 1856, Ostrovsky has been constantly working in the Sovremennik magazine.

Since 1853, every year Moscow and St. Petersburg theaters staged new plays by the playwright, and all of them were favorably received by both the public and domestic critics.

At the peak of popularity

In 1856, Alexander Nikolayevich Ostrovsky went to the Volga region to study the life and life of the inhabitants of the region. It was after this trip that Ostrovsky wrote one of his most striking plays, The Thunderstorm. In 1859, the first collected works of Ostrovsky were published, which was enthusiastically received by critics. In 1860, Ostrovsky began to study Russian history, he was especially interested in the period of the Time of Troubles.

In 1863 he was awarded the Uvarov Prize and became a corresponding member of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences. In the 60s, the playwright founded the Artistic Circle, which gave a start in life to many future stars of the Russian stage. In 1874, on the initiative of Ostrovsky, the Society of Russian Dramatic Writers and Opera Composers was founded. In 1885, Alexander Nikolaevich became the head of the repertoire of all Moscow theaters.

Ostrovsky worked hard all his life, this seriously undermined his health. In June 1886 he died on his estate in the Kostroma province. Emperor Alexander III granted a large sum for the funeral of the playwright, and also assigned a pension to his widow and allocated funds for the education of his children.

Ostrovsky's plays show the life and everyday life of ordinary people, his works are very realistic, but at the same time they pose deep and eternal problems for the viewer.

Ostrovsky can be called the founder of the Russian theater, he created a new theater school and a new concept of acting.

Biography

Alexander Nikolayevich Ostrovsky was born on March 31 (April 12), 1823 in Moscow on Malaya Ordynka. His father, Nikolai Fedorovich, was the son of a priest; he himself graduated from the Kostroma Seminary, then the Moscow Theological Academy, but began to practice as a court lawyer, dealing with property and commercial matters; rose to the rank of titular councilor, and in 1839 received the nobility. Mother, Lyubov Ivanovna Savvina, the daughter of a sexton, passed away early, when Alexander was only eight years old. There were four children in the family. The family lived in abundance, paid great attention to the study of children who received home education. Five years after the death of his mother, his father married Baroness Emilia Andreevna von Tessin, the daughter of a Russified Swedish nobleman. The children were lucky with their stepmother - she surrounded them with care and continued to study them.

As a child, Alexander became addicted to reading, receives a good education at home, knows Greek, Latin, French, German, and later English, Italian, and Spanish. When Alexander was thirteen years old, his father married a second time to the daughter of a Russified Swedish baron, who was not too busy raising children from her husband's first marriage. With her arrival, the household way of life noticeably changes, the official life is redrawn in a noble manner, the environment changes, new speeches are heard in the house. By this time, the future playwright had read almost the entire father's library.

History of personal life

Personal life story 2

First wife: Agafya Ivanovna. According to eyewitnesses, she was a kind, warm-hearted woman, to whom Ostrovsky owed much of his knowledge of Moscow life. According to the law of that time, unmarried marriages in Russia were not officially legally recognized (only since the 20th century, actual marriages have been recognized as legal, regardless of their registration), but they were fully recognized as such in society. The playwright lived in a civil marriage with a commoner Agafya Ivanovna, with whom he had common children, but they all died as children. Having no education, but a smart woman, with a thin, easily vulnerable soul, she understood the playwright and was the very first reader and critic of his works. Ostrovsky lived with Agafya Ivanovna for about twenty years, until her death.

Childhood

Ostrovsky spends his childhood and early youth in Zamoskvorechye - a special corner of Moscow with its well-established merchant-petty-bourgeois way of life. It was easier for him to follow Pushkin's advice: "It's not a bad thing for us sometimes to listen to Moscow mallows. They speak surprisingly pure and correct language." Grandmother Natalya Ivanovna lived in the Ostrovsky family and served as a parish maid. Nanny Avdotya Ivanovna Kutuzova was famous as a great master of telling fairy tales. His godfather is a titular adviser, his godmother is a court adviser. From them and from his father's colleagues who were in the house, the future author of Profitable Place could hear plenty of bureaucratic conversations. And since the father leaves the service and becomes a private attorney for trading firms, merchants have not been transferred to the house.

Studies

From 1835-1840 - Ostrovsky studies at the First Moscow Gymnasium. In 1840, after graduating from the gymnasium, he was enrolled in the law faculty of Moscow University. At the university, a law student Ostrovsky was lucky enough to listen to lectures by such connoisseurs of history, jurisprudence and literature as T.N. Granovsky, N.I. Krylov, M.P. Pogodin. Here, for the first time, the riches of Russian chronicles are revealed to the future author of "Minin" and "Voevoda", the language appears before him in a historical perspective. But in 1843, Ostrovsky left the university, not wanting to retake the exam. Then he entered the office of the Moscow Constituent Court, later served in the Commercial Court (1845-1851). This experience played a significant role in the work of Ostrovsky.

The second university is the Maly Theatre. Having become addicted to the stage back in his gymnasium years, Ostrovsky became a regular in the oldest Russian theater.
1847 - Ostrovsky publishes the first draft of the future comedy "Our People - Let's Settle" under the title "Insolvent Debtor" in the Moscow City Listing, then the comedy "Painting of Family Happiness" (later "Family Picture") and an essay in prose "Notes of a Zamoskvoretsky Resident" .

Creation

"Columbus Zamoskvorechye"

The play Poverty is Not a Vice (1853) was first staged on January 15, 1869 at the Maly Theater for a benefit performance by Prov Mikhailovich Sadovsky.

Ostrovsky Theater

It is with Ostrovsky that the Russian theater in its modern sense begins: the writer created a theater school and a holistic concept of acting in the theater.

The main ideas of the theater reform:

the theater should be built on conventions (there is a 4th wall separating the audience from the actors);

invariability of attitude to language: mastery of speech characteristics, expressing almost everything about the characters;

betting on more than one actor;

"People go to see the game, not the play itself - you can read it."

Ostrovsky's ideas were carried to their logical end by Stanislavsky.

Folk myths and national history in the dramaturgy of Ostrovsky

In 1881, the successful premiere of N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov's opera The Snow Maiden, which the composer called his best work, took place on the stage of the Mariinsky Theater. A. N. Ostrovsky himself appreciated the work of Rimsky-Korsakov: “The music for my“ Snow Maiden ”is amazing, I could never imagine anything more suitable for it and so vividly expressing all the poetry of the Russian pagan cult and this first snow-cold, and then the irrepressibly passionate heroine of a fairy tale.

"The most memorable day for me in my life," Ostrovsky recalled, "was February 14, 1847 ... From that day on, I began to consider myself a Russian writer and already believed in my vocation without doubt or hesitation."
Ostrovsky was recognized by the comedy "Our People - Let's Settle" (original title - "Bankrupt", completed at the end of 1849). Even before publication, it became popular (in the reading of the author and P.M. Sadovsky), evoked approving responses from H.V. Gogol, I.A. Goncharova, T.H. Granovsky.
"He started unusually ..." - testifies I.S. Turgenev. His very first big play, "Own People - Let's Settle" made a huge impression. She was called the Russian "Tartuffe", the "Brigadier" of the 19th century, the merchant's "Woe from Wit", compared with the "Inspector"; Yesterday, the still unknown name of Ostrovsky was put next to the names of the greatest comedians - Moliere, Fonvizin, Griboyedov, Gogol.

In 1863 Ostrovsky was awarded the Uvarov Prize and elected a corresponding member of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences. In 1866 (according to other sources - in 1865) he created the Artistic Circle in Moscow, which later gave the Moscow stage many talented figures. I.A. visited Ostrovsky’s house. Goncharov, D.V. Grigorovich, I.S. Turgenev, A.F. Pisemsky, F.M. Dostoevsky, I.E. Turchaninov, P.M. Sadovsky, L.P. Kositskaya-Nikulina, Dostoevsky, Grigorovich, M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin, L.N. Tolstoy, I.S. Turgenev, P.I. Tchaikovsky, Sadovsky, M.N. Ermolova, G.N. Fedotov. Since January 1866 he was the head of the repertoire of the Moscow imperial theaters. In 1874 (according to other sources - in 1870) the Society of Russian Dramatic Writers and Opera Composers was formed, whose permanent chairman Ostrovsky remained until his death. Working in the commission "for the revision of legal provisions in all parts of the theater management," established in 1881 under the directorate of the Imperial Theaters, he achieved many changes that significantly improved the position of artists. In 1885, Ostrovsky was appointed head of the repertoire of Moscow theaters and head of the theater school. Despite the fact that his plays made good collections and that in 1883 Emperor Alexander III granted him an annual pension of 3 thousand rubles, money problems did not leave Ostrovsky until the last days of his life. Health did not meet the plans that he set for himself. Reinforced work quickly exhausted the body; On June 14 (according to the old style - June 2), 1886, Ostrovsky died in his Kostroma estate Shchelykovo. The writer was buried there, the sovereign granted 3,000 rubles from the sums of the cabinet for burial, the widow, inseparably with 2 children, was assigned a pension of 3,000 rubles, and 2,400 rubles a year for raising three sons and a daughter.

Heritage

Now in Shchelykovo (Kostroma region) there is a memorial and natural museum-reserve of the playwright. Once every five years, starting in 1973, the All-Russian Theater Festival "Ostrovsky's Days in Kostroma" lights up the stage, which is supervised by the Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation and the All-Russian Theater Society.

Ostrovsky's plays never leave the stage. Many of his works were filmed or served as the basis for the creation of film and television scripts. Among the film adaptations most popular in Russia is Konstantin Voinov's comedy Balzaminov's Marriage (1964, starring G. Vitsin). The movie "Cruel Romance", filmed by Eldar Ryazanov based on "Dowry" (1984), won great popularity. In 2005, director Evgeny Ginzburg received the main prize ( Grand Prix "Garnet Bracelet") of the eleventh Russian Festival "Literature and Cinema" (Gatchina) "for an incredible interpretation of the great play by A. N. Ostrovsky "Guilty Without Guilt" in the film "Anna" (2005, script by G. Danelia and Rustam Ibragimbekov; starring - opera singer Lyubov Kazarnovskaya).

After the death of the writer, the Moscow Duma set up a reading room named after A.N. Ostrovsky. On May 27, 1929, a monument to Ostrovsky was unveiled in front of the Maly Theater (sculptor N.A. Andreev, architect I.P. Mashkov).

Plays

"Family Picture" (1847)

"Own people - let's count" (1849)

"An Unexpected Case" (1850)

"Young Man's Morning" (1850)

"Poor Bride" (1851)

"Do not get into your sleigh" (1852)

"Poverty is no vice" (1853)

"Do not live as you like" (1854)

"Hangover at a stranger's feast" (1856) text. The play was first staged on the stage of the theater on January 9, 1856 at the Maly Theater for the benefit performance of Prov Mikhailovich Sadovsky, and then, on January 18, in St. Petersburg on the stage of the Alexandrinsky Theater for the benefit performance of Vladimirova.

"Profitable Place" (1856) text The play was first staged on the stage of the theater on September 27, 1863 at the Alexandrinsky Theater for Levkeeva's benefit performance. It was first staged at the Maly Theater on October 14 of the same year for a benefit performance by E. N. Vasilyeva.

"A Festive Dream Before Dinner" (1857) text

"They didn't get along" (1858) text

"The Pupil" (1859) text

"Thunderstorm" (1859) text

"An old friend is better than two new ones" (1860) text

“Your own dogs squabble, don’t pester someone else’s” (1861) text

"The Marriage of Balzaminov" (1861) text

"Kozma Zakharyich Minin-Sukhoruk" (1861, 2nd edition 1866) text

"Hard Days" (1863) text

"Sin and trouble does not live on anyone" (1863) text

Voevoda (1864; 2nd edition 1885) text

"Jokers" (1864) text

"In a Busy Place" (1865) text

"Abyss" (1866) text

"Dmitry the Pretender and Vasily Shuisky" (1866) text

"Tushino" (1866) text

"For every wise man there is enough simplicity" (1868) text

"Hot Heart" (1869) text

"Mad Money" (1870) text

"Forest" (1870) text

“Not everything is carnival for the cat” (1871) text

“There was not a penny, but suddenly Altyn” (1872) text

"Comedian of the 17th century" (1873) text

"Snow Maiden" (1873) text

"Late Love" (1874) text

"Labor Bread" (1874) text

"Wolves and Sheep" (1875) text

"Rich Brides" (1876) text

"Truth is good, but happiness is better" (1877) text

"The Marriage of Belugin" (1877), together with Nikolai Solovyov text

"The Last Victim" (1878) text

"Dowry" (1878) text

"Good gentleman" (1879)

"Heart is not a stone" (1880) text

"Slaves" (1881) text

"Shines, but does not warm" (1881), together with Nikolai Solovyov text. Premiere November 14, 1881 in St. Petersburg, at the Alexandrinsky Theater, in BenefitsF. A. Burdina.

"Guilty Without Guilt" (1881-1883) text

"Talents and Admirers" (1882) text

"Handsome Man" (1883) text

"Not of this world" (1885) text

Possessing an outstanding social temperament, Ostrovsky fought all his life actively for the creation of a realistic theater of a new type, for a truly artistic national repertoire, for a new ethics of the actor. In 1865, he created the Moscow Artistic Circle, founded and headed the Society of Russian Dramatic Writers (1870), wrote numerous "Notes", "Projects", "Considerations" to various departments, proposing to take urgent measures to stop the decline of theatrical art. Creativity Ostrovsky had a decisive influence on the development of Russian drama and Russian theater. As a playwright and director, Ostrovsky contributed to the formation of a new school of realistic acting, the promotion of a galaxy of actors (especially in the Moscow Maly Theater: the Sadovsky family, S.V. Vasiliev, L.P. Kositskaya, later - G.N. Fedotova, M.N. Ermolova and etc.).

Beginning in 1853 and for more than 30 years, new plays by Ostrovsky appeared at the Maly Moscow Theater and the Alexandrinsky Theater in St. Petersburg almost every season. From 1856 Ostrovsky became a permanent contributor to the Sovremennik magazine. In 1856, when, according to the idea of Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich, a business trip of outstanding writers took place to study and describe various areas of Russia in industrial and domestic terms, Ostrovsky took over the study of the Volga from the upper reaches to the Lower. In 1859, in the publication of Count G.A. Kushelev-Bezborodko, two volumes of Ostrovsky's works were published. This edition was the reason for the brilliant assessment that Dobrolyubov gave to Ostrovsky and which secured his fame as a depicter of the "dark kingdom". In 1860, The Thunderstorm appeared in print, prompting an article by Dobrolyubov (A Ray of Light in a Dark Realm). From the second half of the 60s, Ostrovsky took up the history of the Time of Troubles and entered into correspondence with Kostomarov.

A. N. Ostrovsky

Ostrovsky's plays are known and loved by many generations of Russian viewers and readers. Feature films were shot on them, the questions that Ostrovsky raises in his works are still relevant today.

Childhood and youth

First plays

In 1847, Ostrovsky's essays were published in the Moscow City Leaf newspaper under the title "Notes of a Zamoskvoretsky Resident". However, the playwright gained wide popularity after the publication of the play "Our people - let's get along." This work, written in the comedy genre, was enthusiastically received by the public and received excellent reviews from critics. Gogol and Goncharov spoke approvingly of this play.

However, the representatives of the merchant class did not like the work very much, and after their complaint to the authorities, the play was forbidden to be staged, and its author was fired from his job. “Our people - we will settle” was allowed to be staged only after the death of Emperor Nicholas, in 1861. With the second play, Alexander Nikolayevich was much more fortunate. “Don’t get into your sleigh” was written by him in 1852 and already in 1853 appeared on the stage of theaters. Since 1856, Ostrovsky has been constantly working in the Sovremennik magazine.

Since 1853, every year Moscow and St. Petersburg theaters staged new plays by the playwright, and all of them were favorably received by both the public and domestic critics.

At the peak of popularity

The significance of Ostrovsky for Russian literature and his role in the development of the Russian theater are undeniable and enormous. For the Russian theater, he was a figure of the same magnitude as Molière for the French theater, and Shakespeare for the English. On account of his 47 plays written by him personally, several more were written in collaboration.

Ostrovsky's plays show the life and everyday life of ordinary people, his works are very realistic, but at the same time they pose deep and eternal problems for the viewer.

Ostrovsky can be called the founder of the Russian theater, he created a new theater school and a new concept of acting.